Lower Control Arm +
 

I had no problem with my steering wheel shaking until I bought new tires, then BAM! The wheel shaking issue reared its ugly head. :dunno:

After bringing it back, they re-balanced and re-aligned, with no luck. It made it slightly better, but still very noticeable from 40-45mph on up.

I then bring it to the dealer and they too re-balance the wheels with apparently no luck. $240 later, they told me that I need lower control arms, bushings and tension arm bushings for a grand total of just under $2k. And of course now the shake is twice as bad.

So I was about to bring it to D'Agostino's who is a foreign car garage in Stamford CT (who I've never used) to see what they thought, but now I'm thinking that I'm just going to spend another $150-$200 for somebody to look at it and quite possibly tell me the same thing.

I guess my question is...do you guys think I should just bite the bullet and get it done? I'd order the parts myself for about $450 total and have somebody do the work (NOT the dealer). Probably end up costing me a thousand bucks.

The thing I can't get past is that everything was fine until I bought new tires, so how could new tires cause a need for this work??? It's a 2006 4.8is with 72k miles. Any opinions/advice would be greatly appreciated! Thanks.

Mate I have the same drama. Getting mine back today from the shop after a water pump and alternator install. Mine happens up around the 110 km/h (70 mph).

In my eyes new tyres shouldn't make a difference, not on an X5 anyway, as you have not changed the rolling circumference etc like on a 4wd with over size tyres.

On other cars (I haven't checked the X5), a lower control arm change is an easy DIY job.

Some others on here will be all over it I'm sure.

Thanks Milsy. I was hoping there would be more views on this since I understand that it's a typical issue with the X5. It's just how it came about that irritates and confuses me. It's not as if I have money to throw away, but I guess I'll just go ahead and order the parts. At 72k miles, I guess it can't hurt either way....but if I do spend the money and the problem persists, I'll lose my ever-lovin' mind!! :explode:

If I were you, I would begin by replacing the tension struts or just the bushings in the tension struts if you have a taste for that approach.

Out of curiosity, what brand of tires did you take off and what brand are the ones you put back on?

This doesn't make sense. If the shaking started after you replaced the tires, then it must be the tires. My guess is that even after you replace the suspension components the shaking will still be there, perhaps a bit less noticable. These things typically wear much longer than 72K miles.

i had the same problem......bought tires..i have 06 4.4...old wheels 255/50/19...285/40/19....and got new wheels at..275/45/20....315/35/20.....and notice the same thing...and i thought the same thing what you thought @ricky27.......and finally started doing one step at a time....did the balancing through diff shop...and it fix the issue of shaking.......so far nothing else wrong now..completely straight run...

Yeah I think you are right there, there should be no reason for the CAs etc to start playing up now, must be the tyres and/or alignment.

I’ve seen this problem quite a few times (not on X5's though) and it’s usually caused by either a defect in the tyre, or tyres that don’t have very good manufacturing quality control.
Modern wheel balancing machines can achieve some amazing things in that you can balance a tyre with all sorts of issues.
One of the common problems with some cheap tyres is that many are not actually round, and while you can balance these perfectly, they cause all sorts of strange vibrations and harmonics at various speeds.
Another potential problem is that the tread may not be running true; that is, it has a wobble from side to side as the tyre rotates. Again, tyres with this problem can also be balanced but you will also suffer from odd vibrations as various speeds.

When ever you get a new set of tyres pay attention to how much weight is needed to balance each wheel. A wheel that has significantly more weight than the others sometimes indicates a manufacturing issue with the tyre.

Check this out if you do go that way. I have looked on some prado and jeep forums as that is what I used to have and I'm guess it may be the CA bushes, due to symptoms on other cars. But as I said, the CA change is not an issue, however I hope its just the balancing etc.

http://www.xoutpost.com/articles/x5/...trol-arms.html

Has to be a defective tires... I would have the shop replace all 4 with new

When I got my car it had a really bad shake from 60mph up. Bad enough that I had to always keep it under 60mph. Balanced the front tyres and it got a lot better, but still there.

All the joints seemed OK but I fitted Powerflex bushes anyway. A little bit better.

Changed the tyres and now it's 99% right. Still a very slight wobble but small enough that you wouldn't notice unless you were expecting it.

So my take is that it's a combination of everything. Some combinations work, some don't and there might not be an obvious logic to it.

Thank you for the feedback guys. The tires that were originally on were Dunlop SP Sport Maxx and the new are Continental DWS. Size didn't change, 275/40 R20 in front and 315/35 R20 rear.

For some reason I never thought the actual tires could be defective, but I suppose that's a distinct possibilty. I wonder if the guy will actually replace the tires or whether I'd have to threaten a lawsuit if he doesn't. I really don't want to go through that crap, but fact is...and what I keep coming back to in my mind...everything was fine before the new tires. So frustrating.

If you have the time and $$$ I would almost do the suspension anyway. I bought parts from ECS and then had an indy install them. I have the same amount of miles as you, but I also had a clunk and couldn't get an alignment. I think I paid about $500 total for parts and labor. My indy didn't even charge me for the initial inspection and told me what parts to buy.

If you think the tires are defective, go back to the place that installed them and tell them so. It becomes a problem with the manufacturer of the tire at that point.....unless the tire shop says you have a bad suspension

Wow, only $500 for parts AND labor? I priced out the parts from one of the BMW OEM sites and they came to $450 or in that neighborhood.

I went to the tire guy today and told him the story. I'm going to bring him the car on Monday and he's going to "try" to determine which one may be defective. The service guy at BMW did mention to me that one of the tires (I believe it was rear/left) had an usual amount of weights on it. If I were a betting man, I'd say that's the defective one.

Put your spare on that side and see if it stops....you could check that with all 4

Check the mounting of the wheel to the hub. 40-45mph shakes have happened to me on 3 cars and all were to do with not having a perfect wheel-hub mount.

I had it a few days ago on my X5 after getting my ARB links changed. Never had it before - it made no sense that it could be ARB links causing it so I took off the front wheels. I noticed the drivers side wheel was difficult to remove from the hub after the bolts where out, also the bolts seemed to be tight at a certain point on each rotation when I was undoing them suggesting they were in at a slight angle or the wheel was at a slight angle exerting weight on one point of the bolts.

Anyway, a visual inspection of the hub (after wire brushing all the old grease off) showed that the wheel centering flange of my hub (the bit that goes inside the wheel and the wheel centers on) had a slight lip at one point on its circumference.

I noticed the inside of my wheel had a matching 'cut out' where the 'lip' would sit comfortably. Once put the wheel back so that the lip sat in the cut out, it sat on the hub nicely and the wheel bolts went back in smoothly. 40-45mph vibration gone.

I have no idea how my hub & wheel developed these matching defects, but as long the wheel is mounted in the same way each time it drives fine. Obviously if I ever get new wheels I will need to get a new hub or get it machined.

Anyway, my point is check your mating faces, see if there is any thing putting the wheel at any sort of angle on the hub instead of flat. I read a forum post on an e39 forum of a guy who had this problem until he just kept changing which bolt hole in the wheel was mounted over a particular bolt hole in the hub.

@recklesss - a great idea that I'm embarrassed to admit I never thought of.

@mobilejo - wow!! that's great information, thanks so much!! I'm going to actually print your post out and hand it to the guy who I bought the tires from, and have him check it while I'm there. Thank you! :thumbup:

Well....the third balancing and remounting from the original place I bought the tires from and still the same problem.

So frustrating. I guess my next step is to have them check for defective tire and replace each one until it's solved.

I don't mind spending the money for the suspension parts if I knew that was the problem, but I don't. Once again, it was fine before the new tires.

Who would have thought that buying new tires would have turned into such a #*&$#% ordeal! Sooooo frustrated!! You'd think I could go two months with this car without a problem. And the worst thing is....there shouldn't be a problem! I just bought tires for goodness sakes!

Sorry for the venting. :(

Another thing to be aware of is that most (all ?) modern wheel balancing machines need to be calibrated. They can, and do go out of calibration.
Also, it’s critical the operator of the balancer knows what they’re doing and exactly the size of rim they are dealing with.

My money is still on either a defective tyre or wheels that are just plain out of balance.
My experience with tyre places is that they usually have one guy that knows how to balance all wheels correctly and the others know how to balance some wheels correctly.
Wheels that don’t have any weights on the outside can be tricky to balance if you haven’t been shown how to do this correctly.
I would see if you can find a reputable independent tyre place to check the balance on at least the front two wheels.
Another suggestion is that you find a place that can balance the wheels while they are still on the car (just as a check, not to balance). This is how they do many trucks, and it might show up other issues such as the rim not sitting on the hub correctly.

If you don't mind my asking- did you buy the tires from one of those chain stores or from a dedicated tire shop?

jdd has offered two great pieces of advice in his posts.

First, modern tire machines can make the wheel/tire "zero" out, meaning it'll tell the operator where to put the weights and get a "perfect" reading. But that doesn't mean the tire or wheel is round, just balanced. I've seen badly bent wheels balanced so the machine read all zeros, but it was still bent. Heck on one I'd seen the tire machine was shaking because the wheel was so bent, but it read all zeros. And it'll shake like crazy on the car.

Second, good shops constantly have their machines recalibrated. The shop that does all my work (2 sets of wheels for each BMW, 4 sets for the race car, fresh wheels and tires on the trailer) has one machine just for car alloys. They use their other three machines for SUV wheels and other wheels and tires. Big heavy SUV wheels and tires easily throw machines out of calibration.

Finally- the only way to properly tell if you have a wheel or tire problem is to have all 4 run on a Hunter Road Force 9700 machine. I places a load resembling driving on the street against the tire and spins it. Measures imperfections in the wheel and the tire, but requires that the operator know what they're doing.

BTW- several years ago I had 17" Conti Contact A/S tires on my 528. My tire shop went through 7 tires over a week to get 4 good ones that weren't out of round. Manager said he was seeing that a lot with the continental all season performance tires, to the point he told his staff not to offer them to customers any more.

Have you checked that your calipers are not slightly sticking? I had the 55+ steering wheel wobble twice - once caused by control arms and second time was a sticky caliper.

...agree that it is most likely related to issues with the new tires but I would rule out the easier/cheaper problems first.

GL

Thanks guys, I appreciate the feedback. In addition to the tire place, I had also brought it to the dealer and they also balanced the tires. That's not to say that the guy at BMW necessarily knew what he was doing either, but one thing is consistent...neither place fixed the problem.

In fact the tire place says that my right front rim has a very slight bend to it, while BMW specifically told me that there's no bend in any of the rims. :confused:

This morning, the tire place admitted that they haven't had experience with these large tires very often and thought maybe these Conti's aren't the right tire. I explained to him that they're very common for this model and that when considering all-seasons, there are only a handful to choose from either way.

As of 30 minutes ago, he's ordering 4 new DWS's and will swap them out. When I go back, I'm going to ask him about the machine and the person operating it. This should be interesting.....

Thanks again.

btw, I bought the tires from the tire place in Greenwich directly.

I have not, but will check that out before I go the suspension route. Once we swap out the tires, I HOPE it solves the issue but if not, at least I can eliminate the tire problem from the equation. I think. ugh.

Ok, so I got the X back from the tire shop for the 4th time. Miraculously they ALMOST have fixed the problem. I say "miraculously" because it boggles the mind why they couldn't figure it out the first 3 times. It leads me to believe that it was indeed people who didn't know what they were doing, even though they assured me that "their best people were working on it." Yeah ok.

It's still not 100% though. The steering wheel shakes ever so slightly at 50mph, but not all the time - which I find odd. But at 60mph and above I still feel a little shake in my seat which seems like it's coming from the rear tires, but I can't be sure.

It seems that my driver's side bushing is a little loose, but even they said that it shouldn't cause the shaking, just the little bit of looseness when braking. As far as needing the work that BMW told me...a bunch of BS it seems.

Would it be futile for me to continue to bring it back because it's not 100% or chalk it up to having new all season tires rather than higher quality summers? That will be difficult for me to do. I didn't buy a BMW to have a "decent" driving experience.

Hi guys,

Search for my thread "Vibration still!!!!" http://www.xoutpost.com/bmw-sav-foru...ons-still.html

I had a slight vibration and as you described it got so much worse with new tires i went swaped out with michelins etc still have the problem. ive changed front suspension with cheap then name brand parts not oem though. I changed upper rear control arms and it made a huge help but i still have it. THE worst part is that on some mornings there is no vibration even at 75 and up but on others i can feel the whole car shake at 50ish its ive spent so much money i have given up im just gonna change the rear lower control arm and the rear ball joint since i have 150K and the front trust arms that its if it still vibrating then fuck it ill drive like that. The worst part is i dont see any uneven tire wear nothing.....

What did they do this time?

Just rebalanced them. They didn't replace the tires as discussed. Like I told them, it seems like they're telling me what they want to tell me and not what really was the problem. I stayed there asking question after question that they deflected, with nothing more than..."we're not sure what the problem was, we rebalanced the wheels." :confused:

Fun, right? Everything was fine for me before I bought new tires.

Exactly.....everything was ok and yes there was a slight shimmy above 70 but nothing like what i got now. even with all the work done.....still it feels like im driving on pebble road in those old town areas.....and it comes and goes so its not consistent. its driving me insane but i cant afford a new or another used car (afraid of unknown issues it might have at least i know my issues) .......but i have spent 6k in repairs since nov 2010 that includes new tires oil change new AC system overhaul etc......everything so this thing will get me from a to b for a good 2 yrs i am going to get my moneys worth lol. I wish to just figure out what is the shaking/vibration coming from?

Hey guys, it looks like "the book" mechanics use (mostly dealers' mechanics) to determine how much they're going to rape you in labor, says that it takes 2.5 hours to replace a lower control arm....ONE SIDE.

That sounds excessive from what I've read on this forum. Is it?

For a mechanic, with the right tools, it should be a 30 min per side job, with most time being for splitting the balljoint as you cannot say how easy/hard thats gonna be. The rest of the job is a cinch!

Now if you are talking about the tension struts (can't recall whether they call them upper or lower) and that 2.5 hrs includes changing the actual ball joint too (which is a separate part) then 2.5 hours is not unbelievable if its as badly corroded into the hub as some of them get and the hub needs to come off to get it out. Its still high for a 'book' time though, 2.5 would be a worst case scenario, not a norm.

What he said... 2.5hrs is probably based on removing the hub in order to get the ball joint in a press.

Thanks guys. I figured I'd get the ball joints done as well since I need to replace the control arms, but....maybe not since I need to keep the cost down at the moment.

In regard to "control arm" vs. "tension struts", I think I'm still a little confused. Sorry for the mechanical ignorance. Is the tension strut the rear arm and the control arm the front? That's what I had originally thought. One arm has the ball joint facing upward (which I thought was the rear control arm, some call it "tension strut") and the other, the ball joint faces down (which I thought was the front control arm). I could very well be wrong.

https://wiki.bentleypublishers.com/d...=1268763049553

The TS has the ball joint that faces down, it's the one with the separate ball joint.

BMW call the other arm a wishbone on their parts list. Folk tend to call either or both control arms, wishbones, or whatever else they feel like.

My 2c is not to change the TS without changing the ball joint. I did and it made only a slight improvement. I did the bj later in the week and also the 'wishbone' and then it felt totally different and solid again, and my wishbones showed no sign of play at all, I just did them as they were the original wishbones after 110k

Thank you!

Well....tension struts replaced, ball joints replaced.........shimmy in wheel persists.

Unhappy.

Guy at the tire place is going on vacation next week, so upon his return that following Monday, he's going to call Continental to replace the four tires. Or as he said to me, "ask what the procedure is."

Quite frankly, I don't want hear anything but, "Rick, your 4 new tires are ordered."

:rant:

If you are chasing a shimmy, I would suggest doing both control arms (i.e. tension strut and the 'other' one) and tie rod ends all at once - that way you have changed all bushes and ball joints in the front.

I say this because none of my ball joints or bushes showed signs of play, but once off, you could see the ball joints were gone - they wiggled freely.

I did mine in stages - tension strut first - still not right, other control arm - still not right, tie rod ends - finally felt right up front. I should have just had the whole lot done in one go for ease.

I would fight the tire issue first, my neighbor had same issue after purchasing new tires for his F150. Long story short, his tires would only stay balanced for about 50 miles then shake like hell. Multiple trips and fights later, he has new set on his truck. No issues.

Thanks mobilejo.

I'm actually going the tire route at the moment, like 1stE53 mentioned. I have a feeling that's where the issue is. My tension strut bushings were a little loose, so it's good to get them done, but my mechanic told me that he could have changed the bushings without getting new struts, which BMW told me couldn't be done because the ts's come with the bushings pressed in. They do indeed come that way, but my guy told me he could have gotten the old bushing out and pressed in the news ones. Word to the wise. I apparently am not so wise.:rolleyes:

Yes, I was told the same thing by an indi-shop. The BMW dealership is who actually told me they can press new ones in. I have two bushings in my garage, but am looking for someone who won't charge me the price of new control arms to change the bushings.

Seriously consider chhanging all of the ball joints, tie rod ends, and check the sway bar links. Just because you have done a shake down doesn't mean that the joints aren't worn out. Are there any noises? I really doubt it is the tires because it sounds like people have had the same problem w/ different tire brands. Do the shimmy/vibrations get worse when accelerating or under braking? Is the shimmy still there while coasting? Has anyone checked your halfshafts for free play? You can still balance a bent wheel. I just really doubt it is the tires. That's all.

Ok well...new control arms (front), bushings and ball joints didn't fix the issue. Now the tire place replaced all 4 tires and of course re-balanced and since I had the suspension work done, an alignment as well.

It's worse. MUCH worse. Now the entire car shakes starting at 25-30mph. A very pronounced shake.

Back to the drawing board as frustration mounts. I guess the next step is checking the tie rods and sway bars as mentioned above.

heuer, well you were right. It wasn't the tires. The vibration does get worse at high speed braking. Once in a while it's worse upon acceleration, but not always. It seems that uphill acceleration makes it worse, but again...not consistently.

The shimmy is now much worse and absolutely there while coasting and braking, but I didn't notice it during acceleration last night after I got the new tires and alignment, but that was just 15 minutes of driving.

Let me think about what else it could be. It could be time to bite the bullet and take it to the stealership instead of throwing more parts at it :(

Get under your car when it is parked on level ground an see if you can move your axles b trying to rotate them. That is a good way to check for free play. If there isn't any free play I would then check for a seized caliper or suspension bushings, I would really doubt it's the bushings though.

I am - embarrassingly enough - not the most DIY guy on the planet. I'm not even sure I would be trying to rotate the right things.

I know....I suck. It's part of my overall frustration. If it weren't for you and others on this forum, I would have no idea of the possible issues.

At this point, I refuse to bring it back to those a-holes at the dealership. Due to a few recent experiences...and not wanting to bore you...I hate those f'n guys. I'd much rather bring it to the dope who did the work on the control arms and ball joints. See what he has to say. The problem I had with him is that I bought the parts and told him to do the job. I think he took that WAY TOO LITERALLY and just did what I asked without a concern for anything else.

I just received a bill from the hospital about 'a thing' I had to deal with over the summer that my insurance didn't cover. I owe $2,100. I'm not looking for sympathy, but trying to express how I want to avoid the dealership and may have to suck up this issue - which puts me in a bad mood upon every commute home - for a little while, if the final result is another big bill.

I still love the X and my choice to buy one. I just need to figure this out and get past it.

Check those calipers...I remember reading a thread that it happened to one member here. Your rotors could be wraped?

Im going with seized calipers too.

Thanks guys, I'm going to have that checked.

So, the issue has been fixed 100%, so I thought I'd report what it ended up being.

$10 hub rings. :shakehead:

If I wasn't so happy that I finally have my X-perience back, I'd be PISSED!

got to be kidding!!! Did you replace the entire hub assembly while you were at it?

are you serious? lol dont you have original wheels? interesting. well thanks for the follow up! enjoy the X :)

No sir, it drives perfect.

Well, that was the interesting part...I guess I didn't. I'm the second owner. However inside the rim it still says "BMW". I understand that the replicas would not and would rather have "Made in China" or something similar. So while they MUST be replicas to need the rings, there's nothing that shows they are. That part is still a bit of a mystery.

And so it turns out that I must have had the hub rings and the tire shop just tossed them out when they changed the tires. They eventually replaced all 4 tires (replaced the new tires they put on, with another new set of 4) as you see earlier in the thread. You'd think somebody would have thought of that during the 6 times I brought it back there.

The mechanic at my new and favorite Indy shop knew it before he got all the lugs off the first tire he checked. Unreal.

Congrats. Great it is fixed. If the wheels are OE then there should more markings than just BMW. Usually it says when they were produced and who produced them. BMW does not make its own alloy wheels. Could be Borbet or one of the other OE producers.

If somebody strapped on wheels from another type of BMW with 74.1mm hubs they'd still be OEM but just not the right centre bore for your e53. Or somebody used those wheels on a vehicle that had larger hubs and had the wheels bored out to fit. Either way you are fine with the hub rings.

Thanks Tri! I believe the only markings were "BMW".